The Government is treating these allegations with the utmost seriousness. Child abuse is a hateful, abhorrent and disgusting crime and we must not allow these allegations to go unanswered

Theresa May

The National Crime Agency will investigate claims that children at care homes in north Wales were “sold” to men in the 1970s and 80s who raped them at a nearby hotel.

The inquiry comes as a list of prominent Tories were named on websites as perverts.

A Conservative party grandee from the Margaret Thatcher era has been implicated by alleged victim Steve Messham.

The former politician has not been named but yesterday spoke out in a newspaper interview claiming the allegations were “totally without grounds”.

But Mr Messham last night claimed he handed over photos of the Tory abusing him and other boys to police, but little action was taken.

Mrs May said the probe would look at the fresh allegations as well as the historic claims of systematic abuse in north Wales.

It could be widened to include evidence into the Jimmy Savile scandal and will be headed by the agency’s boss Keith Bristow.

Mrs May said: “The Government is treating these allegations with the utmost seriousness. Child abuse is a hateful, abhorrent and disgusting crime and we must not allow these allegations to go unanswered.”

Former care home resident Mr Messham told Channel 4 News that he stole photographs of the abuse and passed them to police.

He said the pictures showed men abusing boys, including the Tory who he says assaulted him more than a dozen times.

Mr Messham, 51, added that he was threatened “if you tell anyone, I’ll have you killed”.

He said: “I broke into a flat in Wrexham, I was 16 at the time, because he was the one that was always taking pictures in the hotel, in this flat and at various other places.

“I broke in knowing he was away, and I found all these photographs and I handed them to the police – and out of that, two people got prosecuted, and one got a caution and that was it.

“And what was on those pictures was unbelievable, it doesn’t make sense. I could kill them, they wrecked my life. I tried to give up several times, took several overdoses, slashed my wrists several times. What has kept me going is my daughter, without her I don’t think I’d be here.”

No10 also announced yesterday that a High Court judge would head a separate review into the Waterhouse Inquiry 12 years ago into the original police handling of the north Wales cases.

Downing Street said Mrs Justice Julia Wendy Macur would look into claims that the Waterhouse Inquiry only examined a fraction of the abuse that went on at the Bryn Estyn children’s home.